The Hidden Truth
by phorosz
Summary: What if Mark Evans had become so desperate to see his mother again, that he decided to do something previously unimaginable? And what if Sam and Dean Winchester were sent back in time by Castiel to December of 1993? There, the brothers must prevent a grief-stricken Mark from committing an atrocity, and discover that theirs isn't the only family with dark secrets...
1. Desperation

**Chapter 1 **

**Desperation**

* * *

><p><em>Old Town Cemetery. Rock Harbor, Maine.<em>

_December 12, 1993_.

"Did you see your mother after she was dead?" Henry suddenly asked.

The question was a little personal and rather painful, but Mark somehow felt compelled to answer. "I wanted to, but they wouldn't let me."

Henry took another drag, blew out the smoke, and flicked the cigarette down into the well. Out of the corner of his eye, Mark watched the red ember disappear into the darkness. He didn't even hear it hiss.

"You should have made them let you look," Henry said. "It's very important. Nobody actually talks about death. That's why you have to investigate. It's scientific."

The talk of death and his mother made Mark feel very uncomfortable.

"It doesn't seem scientific to me," he said, hoping Henry would just drop the subject. Mark didn't like talking about his mother as dead. He didn't like _thinking_ of his mother as dead.

"What did your mom look like the last time you saw her?" Henry asked.

Mark winced visibly and looked into his cousin's eyes. Henry looked right back with almost no expression on his face. He wasn't grinning or leering or anything. It just seemed like he was curious. Still, Mark wished he wouldn't talk about it.

"She looked kind of pale," Mark said reluctantly.

"Kind of pale?" Henry frowned. "When Richard drowned in the bathtub, I got a real good look."

Mark felt his eyes widen in surprise. "What?"

"He was completely blue," Henry said, circling the rim of the well and stopping directly opposite Mark. "You should have looked at your mother's eyes and lips and touched her skin to see what it felt like. You know, hot... cold... or whatever."

Her eyes? Her lips? Without warning, and without wanting to in the least, Mark pictured it for a second. His mother dead. Her open, glassy eyes. Her pale, bloodless lips. No, it was awful, too awful.

"NO!" Mark shouted. It was too much to think about. Too horrible. He was enraged at Henry's seeming insensitivity. "Don't you dare talk like that again," he snapped angrily.

"Hey, don't get all mad, I was just trying to be scientific," Henry said, feigning innocence.

Mark fixed him with a fierce glare. "Then talk about something else. _Anything_ else," he growled.

"Ooh, temper, temper," Henry said sarcastically. "And if I don't?"

Mark's fists clenched at his sides. Henry wasn't backing down. He continued glaring at his cousin. This was, in no certain terms, open for discussion. Talking about his mother in such a horrible context...A context of death.

It was almost too much for Mark. And he wanted Henry to know that.

They stood there, face to face, in silence for several seconds before Mark responded.

"I'll beat the daylights out of you," Mark said. He walked the rim and stood directly in front of Henry. Then he gave him a shove. Not too hard. Just enough to make him think twice about what Mark had said.

Henry flat out scoffed, unwavering. "I'd love to see you try. Then I'd throw you down there." He nodded down at the black hole below them.

The next thing he knew, Mark had raised his clenched fists. His emotions had become a swirling rage inside him. He almost didn't care about the well – or anything else for that matter. Least of all Henry. Mark just wanted him to shut up about his mother.

Henry raised his fists, too. For one, long moment, again filled with a cold silence, the boys just stared at each other.

There was something so still and empty about Henry's eyes.

Then Henry suddenly dropped his fists and smiled sheepishly. "Hey, look. I'm sorry. That was real dumb of me. I know how I'd feel if I lost my mom." He paused to let that sink in.

Mark hesitated.

"Friends?" Henry asked.

Mark watched as his cousin extended a hand. Once again he felt his anger drain away. When Henry smiled and acted friendly like that, it was almost impossible not to like him. Mark unclenched his fists and offered a hand to Henry.

They shook. Mark wondered if his cousin might try to do something funny, like giving his hand a little pull, pretending to yank him off-balance and into the well. But Henry let go of his hand and they both hopped back onto the ground.

A moment later, and for the rest of the day, Henry was acting as though nothing had ever happened.

* * *

><p>That night Mark tossed and turned in bed. He was still thinking about what Henry had said. About his mother being dead. Truly dead.<p>

There simply was no other explanation. Despite what Mark had tried to think, the evidence to the contrary was far too much to ignore. His mother was gone.

_NO! No, she's not! He screamed into his head._

_A calm, seemingly rational voice answered. She is. _

_No! I won't believe it! I won't!_

_Accept it, the other voice said. It was his own, but it sounded...different somehow. _

_No!_

Just great...Now he was arguing with himself.

Mark cried softly into his pillow. She was gone. Dead...

But what if she could come back somehow? Really, truly come back.

Then Mark thought of a book that Alan Parks had loaned him once. A crazy thing. The story had dealt with someone bringing a loved one back from the dead. But that was a zombie book. Zombies didn't exist.

But if there was _any_ chance of being with his mother again...

It was a thought far too tantalizing for him to ignore.

Mark shoved that train of thought aside for the moment.

Though rather fun for the most part, the day hadn't been without its stressful moments.

Fortunately, Henry had promised him that tomorrow would be better. He sincerely hoped his cousin would be right.

* * *

><p><em>AN: __**This story will use some of the text from the 1993 novel adaption of TGS by Todd Strasser. And it takes place in an AU (diverging from both TGS and the real world).**_

_Disclaimer: I do not own Supernatural or The Good Son._


	2. Old Business

**Chapter 2 **

**Old Business**

* * *

><p><em>Near the I-95I-795 Interchange, Central Maine._

_September 23, 2011_. _11:30 p.m._

This was yet another in the long string of cheap, roadside motels they'd visited in their travels across the country. There was nothing that really stood out about it. Just like every other motel, it was decorated in its own, unique design. In this case, a dirty Spartan-like fashion, with rather tasteless beige wallpaper, frayed green carpet, and stained window blinds. Not to mention the bulky old flatscreen in the corner and a rattling AC unit.

"Guess no one really cares too much about Nowhere, USA," a voice sarcastically intoned from across the room.

Sam Winchester looked up from his tabtop PC and shrugged. "That goes for pretty much everywhere we shack up, Dean."

"Yeah, but this...this one takes the cake," Dean said, a strange look on his face.

_Was that a mournful look?_

"Why?" Sam asked. "Because this place has, how would you say, 'restrictions' on the Internet?"

Dean shot him a glare, and Sam just shrugged in a rather nonchalant way. He refocused his eyes on the computer and kept digging into the background on their latest case. Several people in the coastal town of Rock Harbor had died under mysterious circumstances.

But for that town, such things were par for the course.

Rock Harbor was nearly legendary among hunters. Supposedly, back in late 1996/early 1997, a single spirit had wreaked enormous destruction on the town, even going so far as messing with the weather. Sam vaguely remembered a nearly two-month stay at a motel down in Falmouth. And that their father was just one of over a dozen experienced hunters that had fought it off.

And, with any luck, had killed it. The last thing they needed was some royally pissed-off spirit that could change the weather at its whim, _and_ had an axe to grind. Then again, it wouldn't be the first time that something wanted revenge on their father, only to find out someone (or something) else had gotten to him first.

"Any idea of what we're dealing with?" Dean asked.

Sam looked up from the computer and shook his head. "Not a whole lot more than what we don't already know. Rock Harbor's been a regional hotspot for supernatural occurrences since the '90s. Honestly, we're probably looking for a needle in a haystack."

"In this case, it's probably a whole damn pincushion," Dean said, leafing through some of the more obscure pages of their father's journal.

"What about you? Find anything more in Dad's journal?"

Dean grunted. "Like you said, really nothing more than what we already know. And remember."

"All _I_ remember is Dad dropping us at that motel down in Falmouth in December of '96, him missing Christmas like usual, and disappearing for the better part of two months," Sam said.

"Well, the fact that he was hemmed in by a massive, unnatural snowstorm might've had something to do with it," Dean stated, his tone mildly sarcastic.

Sam ignored his brother's comment.

"Did he say who he thought the spirit was?"

"Every entry from those two months is pretty vague, but from what he _did_ write down, I'm getting the impression that the locals were pretty hush-hush about the whole thing. Especially as to whom it might have been."

"So, we don't actually know whether or not it's the same thing that's killing people again." Sam said, sighing.

Dean nodded. "Pretty much."

He shared his brother's sentiment. Neither of them liked going into a dangerous situation without knowing the root cause.

"What about your computer and those ten magic fingers?" Dean asked.

"No dice," Sam said. "I tried accessing town records, but they were sealed over a decade ago."

"So?"

"So...they were sealed by order of the FBI. Heavy-duty encryption, too."

"Damn."

Dean hated the FBI. Even though Hendrickson had been a demon the whole time he was after them, the elder of the Winchester brothers still cringed when any case involved the federal agency. Pretending to be an FBI agent was one thing. Having a real one on your case, that was something else entirely.

"There's no way someone doesn't at least have clue," Dean said. "Out of twenty-thousand people in that town, and no one's ever said something about it?"

"It's been kept under pretty tight scrutiny. The official, public explanation for what happened was, quote, _"An accidental release of a hallucinogenic compound, spread by contact and airborne particles_.""

Dean scoffed. "Then how did they explain away the freak weather?"

"If they did, whatever it was didn't go public. No one challenged them on it, and the town's been relatively quiet on the subject ever since."

"So, another town with a secret, this one guarded by the government, and a potentially murderous spirit on the loose. That's just great."

"Business as usual, then?" Sam asked.

Dean raised an eyebrow and stared at him.

Sam stared back. "What?"

"That's supposed to be my line, Sam."

* * *

><p>Not ten minutes later, Dean was desperately rummaging around in his duffel, muttering under his breath.<p>

"Dean?"

His brother seemed to ignore him, and had now turned the bag upside-down, spilling a heap of half-clean laundry onto the floor. Sam resisted the urge to sigh.

"Looking for something?"

Dean waved his hand dismissively.

_There were few things he'd look for that desperately_, Sam thought. _Car keys, maybe?_

No, those were on the nightstand.

_Then what... Oh_. Sam remembered something he'd said earlier. _The Internet_...

He sighed and laughed aloud.

Dean's head snapped up. "Something funny?"

Sam just kept laughing.

"Care to share the joke, Chuckles?" Dean asked, his voice getting agitated.

"It's out in the car, Dean."

"What's out in the car?"

A snicker escaped Sam's mouth. "Your...'reading material.'"

Dean shot him a glare. "So help me if you left 'em out there on purpose, Sammy..."

Sam snickered again, and Dean threw a dirty, wadded-up shirt into his face.

"Some people..." Dean muttered as he left the room. The night air outside was damp and somewhat chilly.

"You miss me, Baby?" he asked, patting the roof of the Impala.

Of course there was no answer. He knew that.

Dean unlocked the car and began searching the backseat, then the floor with his hands. Nothing. Dammit! _What did Sam do with them?_

Then his fingers came into contact with something that felt like plastic. He pulled it out from under the passenger seat. Aha! His latest e-paper of _Busty Asian Beauties_. Dean grinned like a fiend.

That grin quickly vanished as he emerged from the backseat and saw that the hood was open. _What the...? There's no way it opened by itself._

Dean could see someone's hand resting just outside the engine compartment, near the hood latch.

He stiffened.

Was it just some shmuck admiring it, or a run-of-the mill crook looking for parts to sell? Whoever it was, they'd be sorry the day they decided to mess with _his_ car.

He pulled a crowbar from under the driver's seat, silently cursing himself for leaving his gun back in the room, and stalked toward the front of the car. Dean had raised the crowbar and was about to strike when he suddenly realized just who it was with their hand on his engine. He'd recognize that trench coat anywhere.

"Cas?!" Dean let out a sigh and lowered the crowbar.

Castiel emerged from under the hood and removed his hand from the engine. "Hello, Dean."

"Dammit, Cas!" Dean said. "First, I'd normally ask what you're doing here, and apologize for almost whacking you over the head with a crowbar. But this time, I think I'll settle for asking what you were doing with my car."

* * *

><p><em>Rock Harbor, Maine<em>. _12:19 a.m._

Jane Philips awoke with a start.

What was it?

The twenty-three year-old strained her ears for anything out of the ordinary. Nothing. But the refrigerator rattled like usual, drowning out most other sounds within earshot.

Then a loud, shattering crash sounded from the living room. Jane sat bolt upright. There was someone in the house! She reached for her cell phone and hurriedly dialed 911.

"911."

"There's someone in my house," Jane whispered into the phone. She was just short of panicking.

"Ma'am, please stay calm. I'm going to need your address."

"531 Fleming. Please hurry."

A screech of static answered. That was odd. Jane rubbed her ear and set the phone aside.

She rather nervously got out of bed, a blue wool blanket wrapped about her shoulders. What was she going to do until the police got there? She moved to lock the bedroom door, but another, far more familiar noise stopped her, fingers poised just above the knob.

A faint mewl. That was Calvin, her cat.

Fear suddenly gone, Jane groaned. Calvin had probably broken something, and she had just called the police for no reason. She could practically see the article in _The Harbor Examiner_ already: '_Woman calls police about potential break-in; Cat responsible_.'

Jane opened her bedroom door and strode out into the hall towards the living room. Sure enough, when she got there, Jane found Calvin sitting on one of the end tables, looking dejectedly at the floor, where lay a broken vase, shattered into a thousand tiny pieces. She groaned yet again.

"Calvin..." she said in a scolding voice.

Indeed, the 911 call had been unnecessary. Jane wasn't looking forward to apologizing to the police.

She picked Calvin from off the end table and stroked his silky tan fur. "What did you do that for, huh?" she asked. The cat merely blinked his eyes. Sighing, Jane locked him inside the laundry room. His pitiful protests reached her ears, but she ignored him for now. She didn't need him getting cut on the broken glass, or breaking something else for that matter.

Cleaning up the glass and explaining her mistake to the police would be bad enough.

When she stumbled into the kitchen, Jane noticed that the refrigerator was now quiet. Not only that, the digital clock over the stove had gone dark.

Just terrific. The power was out.

She growled as she retrieved a brush and dustpan from under the sink.

_This just isn't my day_. _But bad things always come in threes, so maybe_ –

That train of thought came to an abrupt halt as Jane saw her breath emerge from her mouth in a cloud of white vapor. It was a bit chilly outside, sure, but not _that_ cold. She shivered. It felt like the temperature had just dropped thirty degrees.

Another step suddenly found her face-down on the floor.

"Ow! What the...?"

It was just the linoleum, but it had felt like slipping on ice. That was weird...

Jane placed a hand on the nearby rug to help herself up, but she quickly yanked it away. It was frozen solid!

Her mind was soon gripped by an inexplicable fear.

It proved itself well-founded as Jane was suddenly thrown across the room by an invisible force, dustpan and brush dropping from her hands. The impact dazed her and left a crater in the plaster and drywall. Jane barely had time to think before she was slammed into the TV, shattering the screen and embedding fragments of glass in her left thigh.

A scream tore from her throat. And then she was sent flying against the bookcase in the corner. A split-second after she hit, white-hot pain seared through her back as several vertebrae audibly snapped.

Jane desperately attempted to crawl away, but to no avail. She tried letting out another scream, but the cold air had sapped her throat of moisture. All that came out was a hoarse croak. Just simply breathing had quickly become painful.

But even that was suddenly taken away as something gripped her throat, closing her windpipe. Jane gasped for air, but to no avail. She clawed at her throat in terror. Her vision was becoming almost tunnel-like.

_NO!_

She had never thought of death before. And now, here she was, practically staring it in the face.

The last thing Jane felt in life was the icy-cold fingers wrapped around her neck.

By the time the police arrived, Jane Philips' body and half of her living room were frozen solid.

* * *

><p><em>AN: Please review._

_Opinions so far? And any theories about what Cas was doing to the Impala?_

_Yes, I know, there is no I-795 in Maine, but like I said, this takes place in an AU, one where Rock Harbor is a real town and essentially a smaller, American version of St. John, New Brunswick. The 795 links Rock Harbor with I-95. __Falmouth is our Portland; and 'tabtop' is a term I coined for laptop/tablet hybrids._

_Chapter 3 is currently a WiP._


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